Secure access to computers, i.e. the secure identification of the user, is the basis for virtually all the security provisions made in operating systems. Today, access to a system is safeguarded by means of password protection. To safeguard access to a computer system by using a chip card, there are extensions which need to be made to the architecture of the computer system. Each user whose identity code is to be protected by a chip card requires his own chip card on which the functions required (e.g. the encryption algorithm) and the relevant data are entered. A special device is needed to communicate with the chip card. This device, which is called a PINpad, comprises a reader unit, a keypad and a display. It is normally available to the user as an extra device additional to the keyboard and main display screen. The way in which access protection by chip card is achieved is that an additional attribute can be specified for each identity code, namely whether access is now only to be possible by chip card and which users have access to the identity code in question. Within a computer there can be both identity codes which, as in the past, are safeguarded only by a password and identity codes which are safeguarded by a chip card as well.
Access to an identity code protected by a chip card is only permitted if the following conditions are met at the user interface:                the user has successfully performed the logging-on procedure        the user enters the correct PIN for the chip card        the user is in possession of a chip card which matches the identity code in question.        
The user logs on by entering a log-on string at the terminal. The computer is thus in a position to decide whether the identity code concerned is protected by a chip card or not. If it is, the user is asked to insert his chip card and enter the PIN via the PIN pad. The verification procedure then takes place.
Today there is a restriction on the widespread use of chip cards in that the systems used lay down rigid rules as to which applications can be run in what form with which chip cards. Only if the matching counterpart to the application is installed on the chip card, which could even happen by chance, can the client use his chip card with the system concerned. If this is not the case, the application is unable to communicate with the chip card.
However, from the user's point of view, it is precisely when he wishes to vary the systems he uses that it would be desirable for any given system and its applications to orientate itself automatically to the particular user and his chip card rather than the other way around. It would then be perfectly possible to carry about with one a personal system with a customised configuration consisting of a variety of individual applications.
In the case of chip cards, there are standardised identifying mechanisms for making correlations between applications on the card-reading station (off-card applications) and their counterparts on a chip card (on-card applications). These are laid down in standards EMV 96 and ISO 7816. However, the idea underlying all such mechanisms is that the presentation and operation of the overall application which is shown to the client will always be determined by the off-card application. The chip card simply provides data, such as account number, name, address, etc. for one or more different applications. Hence, an application on an automatic account-keeping machine would be presented in the same form to all its authorised users. The option of varying the presentation, such as by varying the language in which the directions to the user are shown for example, would have to be explicitly programmed into the off-card application in a fixed form. If nothing else, customers' preferences of this kind could be stored in permanent form as a notation in the bank's customer database or in a separate field on the card. The first however would not be possible if the customer belonged to some other bank and the second is a proprietary solution which could only be standardised for a few frequently chosen options (such as language) and for specific applications or sectors of commerce.
The object of the present invention is therefore to provide a method and apparatus which make the user of applications which are activated via a token independent of the local functionality of the input system.